


Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

by parasolghost



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Multi, this may seem kind of serious but its rly not, you know what i'll just add characters as they're introduced
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-11-16
Packaged: 2018-02-19 01:25:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2369300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parasolghost/pseuds/parasolghost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Daichi had a lot of things planned out in his life. Unfortunately, becoming a werewolf, getting used to obtaining weird new puppy instincts, being involved in a monster city's power struggles, and falling for a cute witch-boy-in-training with the soft silver hair were not any of those plans.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: Something Wicked This Way Comes

Daichi could barely see at this point. His vision was blurred by his own lack of strength and the raindrops that clung to his half-lidded eyes. He could feel the water from the downpour cling to his clothes and his skin was chilled to the bone. His stomach begged for a meal that he hadn’t had in days and his arms and legs ached for a break. He wasn’t sure how he managed to stumble down the empty alley, his hand tracing the stone walls of the buildings as the other hang limply to his side. The scars and wounds that covered his body seared with pain with every movement and the stench of blood that matted his hoodie made him want to barf.

Heavy showers and a full moon—what a horrible combination for a dying new werewolf.

Daichi felt his body fall to its knees at the end of the alley and his lungs heaved heavily in his chest. It was almost as if all of the oxygen in the world was not enough for him as he opened his mouth to breathe. Daichi crawled his way to the wall as he panted, his fingers clawing at the fabric of his hoodie on his chest and he felt a pain in his mouth. Daichi let out an agonized groan as he felt his teeth grow into fangs and pierce his tongue, fill his mouth with the taste of iron and salt. The transformation was achingly slower than the first time Daichi transformed, as far as he could remember. It was all sort of a blur, honestly, but that might be the inevitable death speaking.

Daichi felt a mix of both absolute horror and relief at the fact that the alley was empty—in fact, the streets of this city were unusually bare. He figured people were probably shielding themselves from the rain in their homes this night, sleeping in warm beds with their bellies full. They could offer no help, but, really he couldn’t expect it. Nobody really took werewolves very well after all, as Daichi had discovered after dodging silver bullets and arrowheads for a month.

But still, as Daichi imagined a warm bed and stable home, he could only think that it must be nice.

Daichi’s eyes fluttered closed and his breathing began to slow as pain surged through his body. How unfortunate, to die a werewolf. Whoever found his body will probably throw it into the forest from where he came and leave him to the scavengers. The thought made Daichi wince—what a horrible way to go.

The rain echoed on the cobblestone roads and thunder began to roar in the distance. It seemed so dull to his ears, which was odd to him, considering how well wolf ears normally worked. It sounded sort of nice, though—Daichi could never really sleep in complete silence.

It takes him a while to notice that the rain that had been pouring on him had stopped and he could hear drops falling on a canvas. A voice called out to him and he began to wonder if he were dreaming or hallucinating. Do people hallucinate before they die?

“ _Hello? Are you alright?”_ the voice called.

Daichi tried to pry his lips open to reply that _obviously_ he was very not alright, but he felt so tired. His muscles began to fail him and his breathing began to slow down. The sound of the storm fell silent and Daichi found himself enveloped in nothingness.

* * *

Daichi woke up to the sound of a door creaking open, but he kept his eyelids shut. The pain that drowned all of his senses had subsided just a bit and, after a bit of thought, Daichi began to realize that he was basically naked.

However, he felt the fur on his arms and his mouth felt more like a snout. He was also lying on a mattress—a dry mattress, and was draped in a blanket.

Wait, wasn’t he just out on the street?

Daichi pried his eyelids open slightly and after a bit, his previously failing eyes began to focus. His breathing still felt a bit heavy and he could barely muster the strength to let his eyes wander, inspecting the unfamiliar room he was in.

He was in a rather plain bed tucked against the corner of the room. A desk was on the wall opposite of his and was strewn with what looked like a cauldron and piles of parchment that spilled onto the floor. A broom leaned against the desk and a black, pointed hat sat on top of the broom’s handle.

Suddenly, he felt the mattress move towards a weight to the side of him. His eyes slowly trailed to the source to find a boy leaning over him with wide, curious eyes. The boy let out a low whistle and the weight subsided for a bit as the stranger raised a hand up to push soft-looking, silver hair out of his own eyes to reveal a mole right by his left eye.

Daichi began to wonder if he had _really_ died and gone to heaven.

However, before Daichi could say anything, another surge of pain suddenly shot through Daichi’s spine like a bullet and his eyes slammed shut as he winced.

“Well,” a calming voice said softly, “this may be a bit of a problem.”


	2. Karasuno's Other Witch (in training)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The actual first chapter and a whole lot of background.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woah okay I finally finished the ACTUAL real first chapter??? I'm so sorry that took so long, but school is keeping busy as hell. If you see any inconsistencies or anything please let me know, because I've been working on this over a period of two months sporadically??? So uhhh there's that.
> 
> I hope this chapter ends up being worth the wait!

Suga had almost fallen asleep at the counter that afternoon. He was only woken when his face met the aged wood and was greeted with a nose full of dust that made him sneeze so violently that the silver-haired witch-in-training almost fell back in his chair. When he had gathered his wits he sat up straight, looking around sheepishly to see if anyone was watching (no one was, to his relief).

After all, Suga was not one to be known for sleeping on the job—he was actually rather hard-working and somewhat respected among the Karasuno community. However, as he sat in Ukai’s empty witch’s shop, listening to the muffled sound of wings flapping and claws scrapping against the cobblestone roads outside, a fading beam of afternoon sunlight coming in from the window, Suga couldn’t help but feel absolutely bored.

Suga frowned at himself as the thought crossed his head. He always felt really guilty about getting bored at the shop—after all, he knew he was lucky that Ukai had barely agreed to take him under his wing three years ago (and even to this day, a tiny demon in the back of Suga’s mind insisted that Ukai only agreed to train him because there were hardly any witches in the Karasuno district). Honestly, though, there was nothing exactly exciting about manning the shop while Ukai went out to do errands, sitting at a counter that was probably generations older than he was.

Sakanoshita’s Witch Shop was humble, as far as witches’ lairs go. The fact that it was a shop in the first place was a clear sign of its modesty. After all, the lairs in the more affluent and powerful districts were modeled after more extravagant structures such as tall towers and grand palaces, which made sense considering the fact that witches served their districts and their skill usually determined the prosperity of the monsters who lived with them. There was a time, Suga had heard, when Karasuno was a grand enough district to build a palace of their own. Powerful monsters were born and raised in the district and there were awesome myths and tall tales of the most unsuspecting and small monsters grew to be defenders of the Kingdom of Monsters and served under the grand rulers in Shiratorizawa to defend the kingdom.

However, when Ukai finally retired after fifty years of power and glory, Karasuno fell into decline. Fewer monsters found the strength and support to reach their full potentials and the district was cast aside. Twenty-five years later, Ukai Keishin, grandson of the senior Ukai, took over as the district’s head witch and stationed his lair in his mother’s old shop. He inherited a district where once grand buildings cracked and aged beyond their years, streets were quiet and bare, and Karasuno ended up becoming a refuge for outcasts, runaways, and abandoned monsters.

Suga heaved a deep sigh and leaned on the back legs of his chair. He tilted his head back only to immediately jerk back up and scramble for the worn out witch’s hat that he forgot was sitting lightly upon his silver hair. Suga wasn’t particularly fond of the hat, but Ukai had insisted that anyone who worked in Sakanoshita’s was to wear it—it was tradition, after all. Besides, Suga was at least given the choice between wearing old, baggy witch’s clothes at work or the neat vest and button-up that had become popular among human fashion recently, so he supposed he really shouldn’t be complaining.

However, Suga always wondered about Ukai’s insistence on sticking to tradition—he was a pretty young guy, just ten years older than Suga himself. Although, when he thought about it, Ukai was still a pretty reserved and mature guy despite himself. He had laid out a lot of ground rules for the witches he trained and was actually rather strict with them.

However, at the moment Ukai was in the human world running errands for the district, not here, and Suga was exhausted from the late training session Ukai had held last night, so he began to figure, as he crossed his arms in front of his chest and he began to nod off, that it really couldn’t hurt if he just slept for a little bit…

Just as Suga’s eyelids began to droop a loud explosion made his eyes grow wide in surprise. Pink smoke began to fill the shop and Suga sat up frantically, forgetting that he had been maintaining a careful balance on his chair. He fell back and his head hit the floor with a thud, losing his hat in the smoke. A searing pain shot through his head as Suga clutched the spot and winced. The smell of the smoke began to fill his nostrils and Suga got a whiff of an aroma so sweet that it was nauseating.

“K-Kageyama,” Suga wheezed feebly as he lifted himself to his knees, still rubbing the back of his head. “Kageyama!” he called out louder, rising to his feet, waving away the smoke in front of him. He was barely able to make out the curtain in front of the back room. As he pushed the curtain away the smoke began to subside a bit. “Kageyama, what are you—”

“You messed up _again_ , Bakeyama!”

A voice interrupted Suga as the smoke started to clear away, revealing Suga’s tall, dark-haired junior frowning at a griffin boy with bright orange hair. Despite being much smaller than the other witch-in-training in the shop, the griffin boy looked up at Kageyama with a fierce look on his youthful face, his feathers fluffing up and his clawless fingers curled into his palm. However, despite all of his aggression, Suga couldn’t help but think that the griffin looked more adorable than ferocious, especially considering—well…

“I didn’t mess up,” Kageyama argued stubbornly as he tossed a cauldron overflowing with an obscure pastel liquid into a pile of other dirty cauldrons that Suga had to wash tonight (the silver-haired witch winced, but didn’t object).

"Really?" Hinata growled, pointing to the feathers on his wings, which were still fluffy and soft-looking like those of a chick’s. "Last time I checked, turning my wings pink isn’t going to help me fly!"

At that moment, Suga couldn’t help but break out laughing at their state of disarray. Hinata jumped in surprise and the feathers around his neck fluffed up while Kageyama looked absolutely mortified.

“Sugawara-san!” Kageyama said, his body rigid. His eyes darted from his senior to the pile of discarded cauldrons, and then back towards Suga. “I’ll clean those up later, I promise!”

Suga muffled his laughter behind his hand. “It’s fine, Kageyama, I just—” Suga looked back at Hinata, who was now sheepishly trying to hide his bright pink plumage. “What happened?”

Kageyama frowned. “I was trying to come up with a new potion for Hinata’s case, but we didn’t have some of the ingredients in stock… So I thought I would try to substitute it with some other things,” Kageyama scratched his chin. “They all had basically the same properties as the missing ingredients so I don’t know why it didn’t work…”

Suga’s smile was wiped off of his face and his eyes grew wide. “Kageyama, that’s dangerous!” he scolded rushing over to Hinata to give him a quick look over. He lifted the smaller boy’s chin and quickly scanning his face before turning Hinata around and looking at his wings.

Hinata fidgeted at Suga’s touch, “Sugawara-san, I’m fine,” he insisted as Suga began to jab at his back muscles.

“Are you sure? You aren’t feeling suck or anything at least?” Suga asked cautiously, heaving a relieved sigh as Hinata shook his head.

Suga saw Kageyama giving him a slightly offended look, but Suga still frowned at him. “Kageyama, why didn’t you wait until Ukai-san got back to make sure it was okay? You could’ve poisoned Hinata or something.”

“Ukai-san said he wasn’t coming back until tomorrow morning, plus I studied these all night—I would never put anything together that would hurt Hinata,” he answered stubbornly.

Suga opened his mouth to argue, but found nothing to say. Instead, what he did find was a surge of admiration welling in him as Kageyama held his gaze firmly. Suga could never imagine straying from the textbook potions that he had read, yet Kageyama wasn’t even afraid of stepping out of the box to invent something new. Despite having only been training for just less than a year, Kageyama had already shown so much potential, excelling in everything from potion-making to spell-casting, that even Ukai couldn’t hold back his praise.

Although Suga was always very proud of Kageyama’s progress and was grateful for his help, he couldn’t help but feel a bit envious as well.

Suga sighed, running a hand through his hair. “You could’ve just waited, you know—I ordered a new shipment of ingredients that are coming in today from Nekoma.”

The embarrassed frown on Hinata’s face was immediately replaced by a huge smile when Suga mentioned Nekoma and his eyes seem to light up. “’Nekoma’?” Hinata repeated, hopping towards Suga excitedly. “Is Kenma coming to visit again? I haven’t seen Kenma in _forever_ —maybe he can help me with my wings,” Hinata added, letting his wings flap a bit.

“I can fix that—you don’t have to ask Kenma-san,” Kageyama said, looking a bit miffed. “We’re getting new ingredients any—“

“Oh no you don’t,” Suga said, his eyebrows furrowed in a look so stern that Kageyama immediately shut his mouth. “ _You_ are going to wait until Ukai-san gets home and takes a look at Hinata—we’re not taking any more risks today.” Suga hated to be the one to stifle Kageyama’s creativity, but there was no way he was going to risk putting Hinata in harm’s way for this.

“But Ukai-san isn’t going to be back until tomorrow morning, right?” Hinata asked, looking at his wings and back at Suga with a horrified expression.

“Sorry, Hinata,” Suga winced, his smile sympathetic. “It’ll only be one day, no one will even—“

“Tsukishima will definitely make fun of him,” Kageyama said bluntly as Hinata’s face grew pale.

“Tsukishima won’t make fun of you,” Suga tried to reassure Hinata, but he could only say it half-heartedly as he considered the blond kitsune. “Probably,” he added with a half-hearted smile.

Hinata let out a loud groan. “Tsukishima’s such a jerk,” he mumbled with a frown. “Just because he’s a kitsune—he doesn’t even have nine tails.”

“I don’t think Tsukishima’s mean just because he’s a kitsune, Hinata,” Suga laughed.

Hinata shrugged. “Kitsunes are cool, though.”

“Either way, Hinata, just don’t mind him,” Suga continued. “After we talk to Ukai in the morning, your wings will be just as fluffy and clean as they were before.”

“I still won’t be able to fly though,” Hinata mumbled bitterly.

Suga couldn’t help but feel a guilty pang as he looked at Hinata’s dejected expression. He had known Hinata Shouyo ever since he and his younger sister, Natsu, first arrived in town—Hinata just a young child and his sister still baby. Hinata’s wings were bent out of shape and matted with blood and his body was beaten and bruised. He was carrying his sister, out of breath and tired, and said that his parents had told him to flee to Karasuno and that they would come for their children when things in the human world began to tide over.

It had been five years—no one had heard from or of Hinata’s parents. Since then, Hinata’s wings have healed to the point where he could move them but, that had taken years of recovery and no one was really sure how to teach a fifteen-year-old boy with no flight feathers and broken wings to fly. Hinata, however, remained stubborn and insisted that he learn to fly one way or another.

Suga opened his mouth to offer some words of reassurance, but found his mouth dry. From what he knew, and what Ukai had insisted, there were no such potions that they knew of that could force creatures to fly or for the flight feathers to grow out.

“Not if you keep saying that,” Kageyama said before Suga could even think of something to say. “I already told you I would help you fly, didn’t I?”

Hinata looked back up at Kageyama, the dejected look on his face replaced with a smile and eyes that seemed to glow with determination. “Yeah,” he said the energy in his voice returning. Hinata’s wings fluffed up as Hinata’s grin grew wider. “Yeah!” he jumped up, his wings stretching as he disturbed some of the items on the table next to him. “You’re gonna help me fly!” he repeated Kageyama’s words with enthusiasm.

“I just said that,” Kageyama replied.

“You’re not allowed to retire until I can fly—right, Kageyama?” Hinata asked.

“I never agreed to—“

“Right, Kageyama-kun?” Hinata repeated, getting into Kageyama’s face.

The dark-haired witch’s ears turned pink, but he held Hinata’s intense gaze. “I wasn’t planning on retiring any time soon anyway,” Kageyama said so quietly that Suga suddenly couldn’t help but feel as if he was intruding on a private moment.

Hinata’s fist shot into the air, narrowly avoiding Kageyama’s chin before jumping up and throwing an arm around Kageyama’s neck, dragging him down to Hinata’s height as Kageyama spluttered in surprise. “I knew I could count on you, Kageyama,” Hinata said, as Kageyama tried to pry the griffin’s arms off of his shoulders.

The taller boy only grunted in reply when he had straightened up and looked away. “I’ll go wash the cauldrons,” he muttered with a sideways glance towards Suga, his cheeks still flushed in a way not exactly befitting Kageyama’s usual intimidating nature as he gather a stack in his arms and shuffled away.

Hinata bounded after him. “Hey, Kageyama, let me help—“

“No, don’t do that,” Kageyama calls over his shoulder as Hinata tries to pick up a cauldron. “You’ll definitely mess up.”  
“Aw, but _Kageyama…_ ” Hinata whined from next to the dark-haired witch.

Sugawara only rolled his eyes and smiled as the two argued. Really, when Kageyama had arrived in Karasuno just a few months ago he thought the two would never get along, but now they were nearly inseparable and, contrary to his prior belief, Kageyama was not as stoic and composed as Suga had thought.

 _Ah, how nice it must be to be young,_ Suga can’t help but think wistfully despite only being a few years older than the pair.

“ _Hey, Suga-san! Anyone home?!_ ”

A call from behind the curtain tore Suga’s attention away from the bickering pair and back to the shop that he was supposed to be running. After looking over his shoulder to make sure that Hinata and Kageyama weren’t going to kill each other over those cauldrons, Suga ducked through the curtains back into the front of the store.

Standing in front of the old wooden counter of the store was a young man in a black sports jacket. His hands were planted firmly on the table as he leaned forward. At the neck of his jacket, instead of a regular human head, a black dragon head with a snout full of sharp teeth and nostrils flaring stood. The dragon seemed to be relieved when Suga came into his view—or Suga couldn’t really tell, I mean, he was a dragon.

“Oh thank goodness,” he said in a voice too human to be a real dragon, “I thought you had left or something, Suga-san—you really scared me for a sec.”

Suga stared blankly at him for a minute before the identity of the dragon in front of him registered. “Tanaka?” he finally said, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah,” Tanaka let out a laugh that was sort of terrifying to look at in his dragon state. “Do you know any other dragon-specialized shape-shifters?”

“Sorry—I just didn’t—“ Suga blinked at him owlishly. “Did… something happen with your transformation?”

“Well, um,” Tanaka began, looking as sheepish as a dragon head could manage. “So, I was speaking to Noya-san today—“

“Oh no,” Suga said with an exasperated sigh, leaning over to put his chair back in its place.

“—and he said that he bet I couldn’t turn my head into a dragon’s and, well, you know I can’t back down from a challenge,” Tanaka rubbed the back of his scaly dragon neck. “So you know, I won the bet.”

“But...” Suga said slowly, giving a stern look that made the shapeshifter instantly look guilty.

“Well, uh, I remembered that I’m not supposed to keep a transformation for more than six minutes, and—uh…” Tanaka gulped and grimaced. “D-do you have any more of that potion from when I was stuck last time?”

"Didn’t anyone ever tell you that if you made a scary face it would stay that way?" Suga tried to scold. However, Suga couldn’t help but break his stern gaze for a fit of laughter the broke through his lips, completely unable to take the mismatch of Tanaka’s bashfulness and the majesty of his dark dragon head.

“Suga-san, this is serious,” Tanaka said, his head lowered in embarrassment and his voice distressed. “Noya-san would never let me live it down if—”

“Let you live what down?”

If complete and utter mortification could be reflected on a dragon’s face, it would definitely look like Tanaka as he turned around to face a short tengu boy that had just walked through the door.

“N-Noya-san,” Tanaka gave him a grimace filled with pointed dragon fangs. “Hey…”

“Hey, N-Nishinoya,” Suga greeted, his voice cracking as he tried to stifle his laugh behind his hand—this was too good.

It had taken him a moment, but when what Nishinoya was staring at registered in his brain, the tengu’s lips broke out into a wide grin that stretched from ear to ear. Nishinoya covered his mouth only for his raucous laughter to ring throughout the store. “I _told_ you you’d mess up!” Nishinoya said, hopping over to Tanaka on his sandals and jabbing a finger at his dragon snout.

Tanaka’s nostrils flared and smoke fumed from them as he frowned. “Hey, you said I couldn’t do it—you said nothing about me undoing it,” Tanaka said stubbornly.

"I heard Nishinoya-san!" Hinata poked his head out from behind the curtains only to immediately squeak, his feathers fluffed up at the sight of Tanaka and hide again.

“Hinata, it’s me!” Tanaka said, sounding a bit exasperated.

Hinata poked his head out again cautiously. “Tanaka-san?”

“Who else would it be, you dumbass?” There was a whack and Hinata stumbled out from behind the curtain, rubbing his head with a sour look as Kageyama stepped out behind him, his sleeves rolled up dusted off his robes.

“Woah, Shouyo what happened to your feathers?” Nishinoya said, hopping over the counter and almost hitting Suga in the face in his path.

“Mind your wings, Nishinoya,” Suga reminded him.

Nishinoya threw a glance over his shoulder at his own jet black wings before closing them completely so that they were tucked generally behind him. He then turned back to Hinata who jumped when Nishinoya lifted one of the griffin’s pink wings with a low whistle. “I don’t know if dying your wings will help you fly, but you _really_ tried this time,” Nishinoya said with a laugh, reaching up to rub Hinata’s head.

“It’s not _my_ fault,” Hinata said as he pouted. “Kageyama messed up.”

“I didn’t mess up,” Kageyama argued stubbornly.

“Um, yeah you _did_ ,” Hinata argued back. Kageyama scowled at him and Hinata’s glare was quickly replaced by a flash of fear as he hid behind Nishinoya. “Wh-what, you wanna fight, Kageyama?” he said meekly  from behind the tengu’s wide wings.

“No fighting in the shop guys, we’ve got glass and potions in here,” Suga reminded them. Kageyama huffed and turned away from the tiny griffin, who stuck his tongue out as soon as the witch had his back turned. Suga rolled his eyes and looked back at Tanaka, re-adopting his scolding glance. “You’re lucky I still have just a little bit of the potion from last time left Tanaka,” he sighed. “Be careful—it could get dangerous next time.”

“Sorry, Suga-san,” Tanaka muttered sheepishly, a hand reaching to scratch the back of his head, making a light scraping noise as Tanaka’s nails ran against his scales. “It won’t happen again.”

Suga bit his lip, knowing full well that this was _definitely_ going to happen again. Technically, he had never read or heard about anything particularly dangerous happening to shape shifters who didn’t have control of their powers and Suga _did_ know how to make the potion to revert Tanaka back to his human form. Nevertheless, the silver-haired witch still couldn’t help but worry.

Suga sighed, deciding to let it go for now. “Alright, hold on just a sec,” Suga relented, walking around the counter towards the shelf of potions to the side as Tanaka let out a relieved sigh.

“Thanks, Suga-san,” he said. “I owe you one!”

“Mhmm,” Suga hummed as he squinted up at the top shelf to see a familiar bottle of a potion that he had just brewed a few weeks ago. He pushed the sliding ladder towards it before climbing up to get it.

“Oh, _speaking_ of holding on a second,” Nishinoya began, perching himself on the balls of feet on the edge of the counter. “Suga-san, did you ask someone from Nekoma to deliver something to you?”

“Yeah,” Suga replied as he reached to grab the bottle from the very back of the shelf. “He should be here any minute—why?”

“Oh, he’s actually already here,” Nishinoya said nonchalantly. “It was that bakeneko guy that yells at people a lot.”

“Oh, that’s Yaku-san,” Suga said, plucking the bottle from its place, careful not to knock over any other bottles on his way out. “How long has he been here?”

“Like…” Nishinoya trailed off, counting off on clawed fingers as he glanced at the clock, “three hours?”

Suga whipped his head around his eyes wide. “Three—“ Suga felt the bottle slipping out of his hands in his panic. He leapt for it, a hand still on the ladder that slid as he pulled it along, the bottle clutched to his chest. “ _Three hours?_ ” Suga repeated. He tucked the bottle into his pocket and slid down the ladder, holding onto the rim of his hat as he went. He whirled around to give Nishinoya a glare that didn’t even make the tengu flinch (although Tanaka looked away as if he had been the one at fault and Kageyama automatically looked a bit fearful). “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“Well, I mean, a lot of things came up,” Nishinoya said with a shrug, “I mean, first I ran into Ryuu, here—“

“Dude, don’t bring me into this,” Tanaka muttered.

“—and y’know I bet him he couldn’t change his head into something cool to impress Kiyoko-san,” Nishinoya continued. “And I mean, you know what happened there.”

“I’m very well aware,” Suga said.

“Well, yeah, and then _after_ that I went by Asahi-san’s place and I was trying to get him to go flying with me,” Nishinoya said, his neutral expression turning into a frown. He sat down on the counter and pulled his knees up to his chest, tucking his wings behind him as he began to sulk a bit. “He said ‘no,’ again.”

“Well, of course he’s gonna say no, he hasn’t used his wings in years,” Tanaka said.

“Where did you leave him?” Suga asked Nishinoya as he walked towards the door. He placed a hand on the door knob and looked outside the window. The clouds began to cover the sun and he could barely make out the street candles flickering on at the day began to end.

“He’s at Take-chan’s bakery,” Nishinoya replied.

“Wait, Suga-san, what about me?” Tanaka called as Suga opened the door.

Suga reached into his pocket, looking at the little blue liquid that only took up half the bottle. “Here,” Suga tossed the bottle towards Tanaka, who caught it neatly. “Take the rest and you should be fine.” He turned towards Kageyama, who was now pushing back the head of a miffed-looking, pink-winged griffin who was flailing his tiny fists at the dark-haired witch. “Kageyama, remember to lock up the shop in an hour for me, alright?”

“Alright,” Kageyama nodded just before Suga slid out.

The streets were emptier now and Suga could barely make out the cobblestone sidewalks as he walked down. As he passed a streetlamp, the candles in the lamps began to flicker on slowly, lighting up the streets with their tiny flames.

As Suga walked down the roads, taking shortcuts through dark alleyways and watching monsters scurry into their homes for the evening, he couldn’t help but admire the way the candlelight shone off the buildings and roads that were worn with age. He could hear the sounds of wings flapping in the distance and smoke coming from chimneys. Suga shoved his hands into his pants pockets and looked up at the sky to see the full moon just peaking out of the clouds. Suga felt a fondness towards Karasuno—even though it was plain, old, and did not seem to know the grandness of districts like Shiratorizawa or Aoba Jousai, it was still his home and Suga was proud to be training under its head witch.

However, as Suga took another turn into an alley towards the bakery and he was enveloped in silence that was too familiar for him to withstand, Suga couldn’t help but maybe hope that something interesting would change the pace of his quiet town.

Suga could see the sign of Takeda’s Bakery in the distance and, just as he walked towards it, he began to hear raindrops falling on the brim of his hat. Suga swiped it off of his head and tucked it towards his arm, jogging towards the store as the rain began to fall faster. Just as he ducked under the overhang of the bakery, the rain began to pour.

As Suga walked into the shop, a bell rang and he could see a young-looking man with glasses and a scarf knotted around his neck talking to a short, honey-haired bakeneko at a table to the side. They both looked up at the witch’s entrance.

“Sorry, I’m late, Yaku-san, I just found out you were here—Nishinoya got distracted,” Suga apologized quickly, a hand running sheepishly through his damp, silver hair. He gave the owner of the bakery a little wave. “Sorry for coming in so late, Takeda-san.”

“It’s fine, it’s not late,” Takeda said with a smile. “I was around when Karasuno used to thrive at night, you know, so this is nothing.” The man got up from his seat for Suga to take his place. “Yachi-kun already left for the night, but would you like me to get you something to eat anyway? It’ll be on the house.”

“That’d be really great, thanks,” Suga said as he sat down.

Takeda smiled warmly at them before shuffling off to grab some cake. Despite his youthful and generally average appearance, Takeda Ittetsu was actually a 290-year-old dullahan that had seen Karasuno grow for centuries (although he had insisted several times that 290 years was “not that old for a dullahan at all”). He was wise and had an air of openness around him that drew monsters to him. He gave advice often and didn’t mind it when people pestered him about his past. Takeda was often the one who brought monsters cast aside by their own districts or those in hiding from human fear to Karasuno and helped them look for a place to stay. However, despite all of this Takeda was also easily flustered and a bit clumsy when he was asked the right (or perhaps… wrong) question or confronted with situations that confused him and he would often… er, lose his head both figuratively and metaphorically in a panic.

However, as of now, the dullahan seemed to be relatively at ease, maybe due to the fact that it was night and that rain was pouring in a rather soothing rhythm on the rooftop. He hummed as he cut a slice of cake for Suga and his head bobbed back and forth in his scarf.

“But, yeah, it’s gotten really late for you, so I’m really sorry about that,” Suga winced as he looked at Yaku. “I know you’re not really fond of rain… I’d offer you a place to stay, but Ukai-san is _really_ strict with our ‘no-guests’ rule.”

“It’s fine, Takeda-san actually said I could stay here for the night,” Yaku replied through a mouthful of cake.

"You don’t have to get back to Nekoma or anything?" Suga asked, giving Takeda a smile in thanks as he set down a plate of cake for him.

“Not really, plus Kuroo would get mad at me if I headed back on a full moon now of all times,” the bakeneko said, smirking a bit. “There was a whole fiasco about whether or not Kenma should come with me, but Kuroo was pretty adamant about keeping him in Nekoma tonight—he almost made me wait until next week to deliver your stuff, too.” Yaku ducked under the table to retrieve a heavy-looking bag that sat at his feet and passed it over to Suga, his nose wrinkling at the odors coming from the bag, his cat ears flattening in disgust. “I don’t know how you witches keep working with all this stuff—it’s putrid. No wonder your head witch doesn’t let people stay at your place.”

Suga laughed as he placed the bag next to him. “Thanks a lot, Yaku-san, we really needed this stuff,” he said. “It’s too bad Kenma couldn’t come though. Hinata was really looking forward to seeing him again.”

Yaku laughed. “Yeah, well it couldn’t really help with the whole werewolf thing going on.”

Suga blinked at him, his face blank and Yaku looked at him with wide eyes.

“Wait, do you not know about the werewolf rumors?” Yaku asked.

“I thought werewolves went extinct 20 years ago or something,” Suga said.

“You know, I thought that too,” Yaku said, his voice low and grave, leaning forward as he spoke, “but the word is that there’s a werewolf on the loose in Aoba Jousai—it took off a chunk of a griffin’s wings.”

Suga’s eyes widened. “Aoba Jousai?” he repeated. The grand district was rather close to Karasuno and Suga couldn’t imagine how he would deal with a werewolf attack.

“Yeah, they’re trying to keep it under wraps, but you know how news spreads around the kingdom.”

“What happened to the griffin?” Suga asked.

Yaku shrugged as he took another bite of his cake. “I’m not really sure, but I’ve heard that they were dragged up to Shiratorizawa—who knows what happens after that.” A silence fell between the two of them for a second before Yaku noticed that Suga was looking a bit pale. “I mean, I’m sure it’s alright now—it probably won’t reach you guys here in Karasuno!” Yaku reassured him quickly. “Besides it’s just a rumor—it might not even be true!”

Suga let out a laugh that was a bit too shaky for his liking so he finally took a bite of his cake, feeling an instant relief in the not-too-sweet deliciousness that enveloped his taste buds. Takeda really did know his customers well.

“It’s a wonder how Kuroo let you come here alone at all, though,” Suga said.

Yaku rolled his eyes, but Suga could see a fond smile playing on the bakeneko’s lips. “He almost didn’t—I had him and Lev insisting that they come with me for hours before I threatened to curse them,” Yaku said, his tail swishing leisurely behind him. “The big worrywarts—I can handle myself just fine.”

Suga laughed as he took another bite of cake. Suga had visited Nekoma enough to know that Yaku threatened to curse his friends all of the time, but never actually did as he promised. He had only ever heard Yaku’s threat of a inflicting a horrible curse come to fruition once when, apparently, he had come across a group of shape shifters had been picking on Haiba Lev, the tall sphinx in Nekoma that Suga had seen hanging around Kenma’s lair. Apparently it had gotten so bad that the shapeshifter gang had left town in hopes of appeasing the tiny bakeneko.

(When asked about whether or not he had actually lifted the curse, Yaku would give a sly smirk and a shrug. “Who’s to say,” he’d reply calmly, “but I really hope one of them doesn’t accidentally mess with an angry vampire from Shiratorizawa in the next two days.” Or something equally scary sounding.)

As the evening went on and the two caught up with each other, Yaku ranting about his friends in Nekoma and Suga talking about all the trouble he had to help Nishinoya and Tanaka get out of, Suga began to notice that his cake supply had been depleted and it had gotten late. The rain beating on the rooftop had only grown harder and Suga found himself stifling a yawn.

“Well, I better head back to the shop,” Suga finally decided, pushing back his chair with a loud squeak on the tiled floor. He hoisted the bag strap over his shoulders as Yaku let out a yawn himself.

“Sugawara-kun, you’re welcome to stay here for the night as well—it’s pouring rather hard out there,” Takeda said from the counter.

“Thanks, but I should probably see if Kageyama’s alright without me,” the witch replied. A voice in the back of his mind reminded him bitterly that the other witch was probably doing better than fine without him, but Suga pushed the thought aside to give Takeda a grateful smile.

“Well, at least take an umbrella with you,” Takeda said as Suga headed towards the door. The dullahan crouched behind the counter to retrieve a tall black umbrella that he handed to the witch. “It would be terrible if you got sick.”

As he heard the rain thundering outside, Suga really couldn’t say disagree, so he took the umbrella from Takeda with a thank you and waved Yaku goodbye.

As soon as Suga opened the door he could already feel the heavy raindrops splashing on him and he opened the umbrella, thankful that the rain was at least falling vertically.

“Be careful out there, Sugawara-kun.”

Maybe it was the atmosphere with the heavy rain or maybe it was the fact that the dullahan’s words came out like a whisper, but Suga couldn’t help but feel a chill run down his spine at Takeda’s warning. Suga looked over his shoulder, but Takeda only gave him his normal, warm-hearted smile.

“I will,” Suga said giving him a wave with his free hand before stepping out of the overhang. He heard the bells of the bakery ring as the door closed and he was alone in the rain.

Walking by himself, especially when he felt a bit wary, always made Suga’s walks seem longer than he would want them to be. The hand on the umbrella handle was frozen in a tight grip and Suga’s footsteps felt hesitant and cowardly. The candle street lamps flickered haphazardly with the rain, their light sharpening as Suga passed them and immediately dimming when he had gone. The streets were empty as ever—no monsters in Karasuno dared to step out into the dark anymore for reasons unknown to Suga.

As Suga approached the street the shop was on, he immediately noticed that all the streetlamps had gone out. It was an unusual phenomenon, considering the candles were fueled and protected from the rain by magic. Suga made a mental note to tell Ukai about it when he came back, but for now, he just lit the lamps as he passed, watching the candles immediately flicker off as he passed them and the next one turning on when he stared at it. Although Suga barely light flames (even tiny ones like the candles in the streetlamps), he was thankful for the tiny amount of magic he had to comfort him in the darkness.

However, Suga would have felt even better about this if he could actually hear his surroundings, but the heavy rain drowned out all the other sounds around him as rain crashed on the umbrella and roads. Despite the candles that lit his path, he could barely see well enough to navigate around puddles and almost tripped a few times over the uneven cobblestones. Only the source of stable light of the full moon gave Suga adequate enough light for him to be sure that, yes, he was heading towards the shop and not towards some dark and dangerous alley.

Soon enough, Suga could finally make out the shop at the end of the road and its crooked wooden sign. There was a single lamp lit in the window that Kageyama had lit for Suga and he felt utter relief. Making a mental note to thank Kageyama morning, Suga stepped forward only for his foot to kick something that groaned.

Suga let out a yelp, almost dropping the umbrella in surprise. His frozen fingers fumbled with the handle until he was holding it properly again and he stared at the object had run into. There was a dark figure leaning against the building, chest heaving as it breathed heavily. After Suga’s eyes had adjusted, he realized that the figure was rather human-looking and he immediately panicked.

“H-hello?” he called out feebly. He stepped closer, letting the umbrella shield the man. “Are you alright?” The man’s eyes fluttered open for a second, as if he were going to reply, only to shut once again, his head lolling to the side. Upon closer inspection, Suga noticed that blood stained the man’s side and his clothes were torn almost to shreds. Although Suga had seen worst wounds on monsters that he had helped himself, Suga was sure that this sort of thing could be fatal to a human.

He looked back and forth, praying that there was someone out on the streets to help him out, but to no avail. Suga bit his lip, thinking of Ukai’s stern rules and regulations, and then he looked at the shop just a few feet away.

Suga bent down, dropping the umbrella in order to lift the man’s arm over his shoulder. “Alright, it’s gonna be okay,” Suga said, mostly to himself. “Don’t die on me! We’re _so_ close to home.”

The man was a bit heavier than Suga and the bag that he had gotten from Kenma was starting to cut into his shoulder. He could feel the man’s arm, wet from the rain, slipping from his grasp, and was immediately guilty when he had to all but drag the man to the shop, muttering silent apologies under his breath.

Suga had to feel around for the doorknob as they approached the shop, which didn’t budge as he turned it. He swore under his breath as he remembered that he had told Kageyama to lock it for him. He set the man back against the wall with a quick apology. Suga stood up on his toes to touch as far up the edge of the door as he could and traced his fingers downward until he was crouching and his fingertips hit the flooded sidewalk. He pressed his ear against the door until he could hear the faint sound of the lock clicking and sighed in relief, thankful that, out of the very little magic he could do, that at least lighting candles and unlocking doors were some of them.

Suga opened the door and dragged the man into the shop, letting him lie on the floor as Suga grabbed the candle from the window. He held the light to the boy’s abdomen to see that there was blood staining his shirt, which clung to him like it was stuck, and what looked like scratches and bite marks soaking up his pant leg. He quickly got up to retrieve the scissors from behind the counter before returning and snipping away at his clothes until he could see the raw wounds in the man’s flesh. Something like this had wounded a vampire that Ukai had tended to just last week and Suga was lucky enough to have been there when Ukai had put away the stock potion.

“You’re going to be okay,” Suga said. “Just sit tight for me, alright?” The witch got up from his spot, walking briskly towards the shelf. When he began to climb up the ladder, the candles to either side of the shelf lit up for him to see the array of colors and potions that were stocked. On the fifth shelf was a blue potion in a tiny vial sitting in a rack of other potions. As Suga plucked the potion from its spot, he felt a moment of panic that it wasn’t enough. Nevertheless, the witch slid down the ladder with what remained of the potion in the tight grasp of his fist.

Suga crouched beside the man, nudging him slightly on his side so that he could see the wound more clearly in the candle light. He uncorked the potion and tilted it over the wound, his hands a bit shaky as a drop of the liquid rolled off of the edge and onto the stranger’s flesh. As the potion made contact with his skin, there was a sizzling sound and wisps of smoke rose the spot where it hit. The man flinched and groaned, his fingers curling into tight fists.

Suga put a hand on the man’s broad shoulder. “I-it’s alright,” he said, his voice wavering. His eyes flickered towards the staircase leading to the living area of the shop, hoping that Kageyama wouldn’t wake up anytime soon. “You’re gonna be fine.” To his utter relief, just as he said those words, the smoke began to clear and there grew skin where the wound was just seconds before, all healed and new.

So Suga repeated the process, muttering words of comfort with each drop of potion until the stranger was healed of his potentially fatal wounds and the vial was empty. Suga sighed with relief as the man’s breath began to even out and the wrinkles on his forehead began to relax.

Now that he was taking a closer look with better lighting, he could make out the rest of the man’s features. He had short black hair that had dried a bit since being soaked in the rain and a strong square jaw. Despite all of the scratches and wrinkle lines that were faint on his face, Suga could tell that he looked like he was around Suga’s age, or at least not more than two years older. The young man had broad shoulders and arms that were noticeably tan next to Suga’s paler skin and, although he didn’t look like he was much taller than Suga, he was definitely more muscular. The stranger’s chest heaved dramatically as he breathed through slightly parted lips and raindrops still clung to his short eyelashes.

As Suga stared at him, he couldn’t help but think the stranger was actually pretty attractive.

The sudden crashing of thunder outside pulled Suga out of his daze and the witch blushed bright red, shaking his head. No matter how attractive this guy was, Suga was supposed to be a professional (or at least, as professional as a witch-in-training could be).

He looked out of the window at the rain still pounding on the streets. There was no way he could heal this guy and just throw him back out into the rain, no matter what Ukai said. So Suga sighed, heaving the man’s arm over his shoulder once again, hoping that Kageyama was a heavy enough sleeper not to hear him sort of carry, sort of drag the man up the stairs and into his room.

When Suga had finally gotten to his room, sort of out of breath and his muscles aching, he somehow managed to get the stranger to lay on top of his bed with some difficulty and draped his quilt over the man. After all, it was a pretty cold night and Suga couldn’t help but feel guilty for stripping this guy of his clothes just to leave him almost naked on a stranger’s bed. With all he could do having been done, Suga decided that he might as well organize the new stock downstairs, considering his bed was preoccupied and maybe bring up some water for the when the stranger would wake up in due time.

Suga walked out of his bedroom door and into the hallway, closing the door quietly behind him with one eye on Kageyama’s door just at the end of the hallway. Kageyama had always been a rather light sleeper, but, for tonight in particular, it seemed like the other witch was in such a deep sleep that all the commotion Suga had been causing downstairs was not enough to wake him, which was completely understandable considering all the work he had done today for Hinata.

Nevertheless, Suga made sure to tiptoe down the stairs with great care, wincing at the creaking of the old wooden steps underneath his feet and jumping at the sound of thunder crashing overhead. Otherwise, Suga was relatively silent. He walked down to the main part of the shop with relative ease and found himself being lulled into a sense of security with the pouring rain drumming faintly overhead. Suga walked to where he had dumped the bag of supplies, humming as he removed jars upon jars of strange substances and placed them on the counter.

Suddenly the door was thrown open behind him and Suga let out a tiny shriek, jumping as he stared at the door with wide eyes.

“U-ukai-san,” he stammered his voice a bit high. “Hey!”

Ukai raised an eyebrow at the boy as he closed the door behind him, he shook an umbrella dry and Suga gulped.

He had forgotten about the umbrella.

“Hey,” Ukai replied. “What are you doing up so late?”

“I-I just came back from Takeda-san’s to pick up the supplies from Nekoma,” Suga answered quickly.

“This late?”

Suga let out a laugh that he hoped didn’t sound too uneasy. “Yeah, I mean I just spent a lot of time talking to Yaku-san, you know,” Suga said, scratching the back of his neck. “I thought I might as well put all of it away before I went to bed.”

Ukai hummed thoughtfully. “Y’know, you can just do that in the morning, right? Kids like you should get some sleep.”

“Right,” Suga said, biting his lip as he thought of the young man currently sleeping in his bed. “I guess I’ll go—“

“Hold on a second,” Ukai interrupted him.

A chill ran up Suga’s spine and he could feel his hands getting clammy as Ukai narrowed his eyes at him. Suga could feel himself rocking a bit under Ukai’s gaze. He really wasn’t good at this whole lying thing. Did he find out that there was a stranger sleeping in his room? Or does he know that he just used up a potion to heal someone potentially dangerous? Can he just _sense_ the guilt in Suga’s soul? Ukai probably knew _everything._

“Does something kind of smell like blood to you?” Ukai finally asked after a while.

_Shit shit shit shit—was Ukai a grim or something? Shit._

“I don’t know does it? I don’t really smell anything,” Suga said quickly, forcing a laugh as he ran a hand through his hair and letting it rest on his neck as he avoided Ukai’s gaze by looking towards the shelf. He could almost _feel_ Ukai absolutely _not_ buying it. “I-I mean, Kageyama tripped today and kind of scratched himself,” Suga lied quickly. “M-maybe it’s that?”

“I dunno, that’s kind of…” Ukai interrupted himself with a yawn. “Well, whatever, go get some sleep, Sugawara. I’ll handle the stock.”

“Yessir,” Suga said much too quickly for his liking before he raced back up the stairs, his heart hammering in his chest before he threw his bedroom door and closed it with a slam, wincing when he heard the bed creak.

However, as the witch turned to the bed to mutter a soft apology, he found that the young man he had just healed had suddenly grown dark fur that stretched over his arms and shoulders, his face had grown a snout in place of his mouth, and his ears had elongated and pointed. A hand that fell out of the blankets was now clawed and paw-like and the man’s fingers curled and uncurled into a fist as he began to pant, his breathing sounding more like growling,

Suga felt dread wash over him like a wave and pressed his back against the door. _Oh my god_ , he gulped. _It’s a werewolf._ He held his breath as he groped behind him for the door knob frantically, sweat beading at the back of his neck as the werewolf’s stirred into consciousness and his eyes shot open, gold irises glowing in the dark.

Then, suddenly, all of the motion had stopped and the room went silent. The werewolf’s wide eyes relaxed, his breathing began to calm and his ears went back to normal, the fur disappeared, and his snout became a human nose and mouth once again. It wasn’t until Suga relaxed his shoulders and arms that he felt the ache of tiredness in them and he figured that the full moon must have been over.

Suga approached the bed slowly, ready to run at a moment’s notice if he changed back. However, when he saw the man’s face, worn and tired, and his breathing still a bit heavier than normal, Suga figured he probably wasn’t in any real danger. Suga leaned over, brushing the hair out of his eyes as he examined the man’s face for any signs of pain or damage. However, he looked more exhausted than injured, much to Suga’s relief. The golden eyes that stared at him faded to brown and Suga couldn’t help but feel impressed.

His sense of security was short-lived, though, he heard the creaking of the floor of the hallway. Ukai had always had heavy footsteps and they were mistakable right now. They came closer and stopped right in front of the door. Suga held his breath as if it would hide him from Ukai’s wrath. The suspense gnawed at him and his heart hammered before the steps began again, fading away before disappearing with the opening and closing of Ukai’s door.

Suga sighed in relief and suddenly the werewolf winced. Suga looked back to see his eyes squeezed shut and he panicked for a minute, before he relaxed again, and steadied. Quick-healing potions were never easy to endure, but they were better than the alternative.

Suga bit his lip as he stared at the man, Yaku and Takeda’s warnings rang in his head and Suga finally took a seat on the edge of his bed, his body wearied and his legs instantly relieved as he looked back at the werewolf.

“Well,” he muttered to himself, “this may be a bit of a problem.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *writes 23 pages of story just to end up exactly where we did last chapter* awesome and Daichi was only there for like the last third of the story.
> 
> Thanks for sticking around! Who knows when I'll update next but stay tuned! B)

**Author's Note:**

> SO this is mostly a self-indulgent multichapter fic for me because I love monster aus more than anything lmaoo  
> that was the prologue??? so that means next chapter whenever that happens u get to officially meet Suga and some crows ANDDD world-building but for now I just wanted to get this up B)
> 
> Thanks for reading! I do hope you guys'll stick around u v u


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